The men who predicted the Grenfell fire tragedy are to have their words immortalised in a brand new play which shows how a tragic sequence of events unfolded.

In November 2016, Francis O'Connor and Edward Daffarn collaborated on a blog post about their concerns about fire safety at Grenfell Tower in north Kensington.

Nobody knew it at the time, but the post titled Playing with Fire, foretold the tragic events of the future.

In it, the pair who collaborated on Grenfell Action Group blogs, warned that they feared that "only an incident that results in serious loss of life" would shine a spotlight on the tenant management organisation which oversaw housing at Grenfell Tower.

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The blog said: "It is a truly terrifying thought but the Grenfell Action Group firmly believe that only a catastrophic event will expose the ineptitude and incompetence of our landlord, the KCTMO, and bring an end to the dangerous living conditions and neglect of health and safety legislation that they inflict upon their tenants and leaseholders."

Now those incredible words will take centre stage in a new documentary play called Dictating to the Estate by Notting Hill playwright Nathaniel McBride.

Playwright Nathaniel McBride whose play, Dictating to the Estate, tells the story of the events leading up to the Grenfell Tower fire. It opens at the Playground Theatre on January 26. (Image: Julia Gregory)

The words of Mr Daffarn and his fellow blogger, Francis O’ Connor, will feature in the show to be staged at the Playground Theatre, a few minutes walk from Grenfell.

The blog post also features in the Living with Buildings exhibition at the Wellcome Collection in Euston (until March 3) and Mr Daffarn was on charity Shelter's social housing commission.

The cast of six at the staged reading at the Playground Theatre will speak the words of some of the key players associated with Grenfell.

The characters they voice will be familiar to those living nearby or who have followed the £10m regeneration of Grenfell - which included new cladding, windows and boilers - the fire and its aftermath.

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Mr McBride who ran in last May’s local elections as a Labour candidate for Holland ward, said: "The play has a political view. It tries to be accurate.

"It is not about the fire, it is about the events that led up to the fire."

Instead he has drawn on "contemporary documents" including the blog posts and emails.

He explained "I had the idea about a play about housing activism in Kensington and Chelsea before the fire. I had an idea in March 2017 and started thinking about how to do it.

"It is particularly a play about housing activism."

It will look at the decisions which led to cheaper cladding being used on the tower, along with social housing regeneration policies and changes to core housing strategy which meant the council "effectively revoked its decant policy," said Mr McBride.

He re-read the work of playwright Peter Weiss, who is best known for his play Marat/Sade and The Investigation, a documentary drama about the trials of those behind the atrocities at Auschwitz.

Research included council papers from the 1960s, but by the autumn of 2017 he realised the play would be about Grenfell.

"They had an obligation to rehouse the social housing tenants but were undermining where those people were going to be rehoused," he said.

Mr McBride has contacted everyone who features in the play, although he is uncertain if many of them will attend.

And he says he cannot predict how it will make people feel.

"They will have a narrative of what happened locally and the issues immediately before the fire. How they will react, I do not know."

Dictating to the Estate is at 2.30pm on Saturday January 26 and 7.30pm on Sunday January 27, tickets £8, concessions £6, from https://theplaygroundtheatre.london/events/dictating-to-the-estate/

Box office 020 8960 0110

Mr McBride is also trying to raise £5,100 to develop the play after its staged reading at the Playground Theatre.

You can donate by going online to: https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/dictatingtotheestate